Child protection and the modernised family justice system

This chapter sets out to examine the impending changes in law and practice in the context of child protection and goes on to explore the implications of these changes for the child protection system. It focuses on the Family Justice Review, the Munro review, the Government response to these and the proposals for a ‘modernised family justice system’. It is suggested that the changes heralded by these documents will not necessarily lead to better decision-making in relation to vulnerable children and their families. In addition, the changes will leave social workers and perhaps even judges more vulnerable than ever to criticism

Working Report #2: Client and Community Relations (Service Provider Perspectives)

This report addresses two important questions: how much emphasis is placed on building positive relationships with families and communities across agency based, integrated service, and community and school based models of service delivery? And, how successful is each model at building relationships, minimizing stigma for families, and improving the image of child welfare in the community? Educating clients and the community about child welfare services was identified as an important role for workers in some sites and not in others. While families’ fears of child protection services were a concern, some workers also expressed a fear of their clients and feared for their own personal safety in their work. Service providers within each model seemed to be oriented to different aspects of relationship building and also had different advantages and disadvantages. For example, community based and school based models provided unique forums for engaging with clients and other service providers. Heightened awareness and concern about stigma in many agency based settings was noted; while, in community based and school based settings workers saw themselves on the front-line of improving the agency’s image and building relationships with the community